February 2019

Again it is my sad obligation to say "farewell" to a long-term chessfriend, but a quite silent member of our small collector's realm. When I moved to Wuppertal in 1999, Bernd Schippan was a well-known (and renowned) chessplayer of master strength in the so-called "Industriegebiet".

However, I only noticed him as an ardent collector of valuable chess literature and especially of chess autographs, after the foundation of the Ken Whyld Association. In the early years of our association, we had many email exchanges about "market evaluation" and "prices", mainly based on David DeLucia's A Few Old Friends (2003). Laterly, I was often amazed by the "bidding contests", Bernd Schippan was involved at the auctions in Brunswick.